


Unmorning

by crystalsexarch



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Ambiguous Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Established Relationship, F/M, Gen, M/M, Missing Scene, Patch 5.3: Reflections in Crystal Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-11
Updated: 2020-08-11
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:15:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25850437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crystalsexarch/pseuds/crystalsexarch
Summary: Short but plenty of 5.3 spoilers herein, so tread carefully. If I write more ambiguous 5.3 content I will also slap it in here.A missing scene you'll see missing scene'd time and time again.
Relationships: G'raha Tia | Crystal Exarch/Warrior of Light
Comments: 9
Kudos: 131





	Unmorning

**Author's Note:**

> I just had to do SOMETHING okay?! It's not like I can write SMUT in these conditions!
> 
> Not meant to be literary folks, just an ~Impression~

You had seen the Scions come to life, seen their faces brighten, the sheen of their skin wane into something mostly natural. Alisaie first, then the others shortly after. Each as sure as the next. As certain. And _you_ were certain, as soon as you saw the twitch of the young Elezen’s fingers, that the Rising Stones would soon have a full complement of Scions to occupy its halls.

You want to extend this certainty to Raha. But you cannot.

Not when his words feel so final in your memory, not when you’ve seen his crystalline body stand immobile before that haunted throne. You are _returning_ him—just as you returned the Scions—but you feel you have twisted the act into something brittle, and you are afraid to curse it, too, by grinding it between your teeth.

So when you find him, you bite back an emotional response and set the talisman to the right of his sleeping head. Set yourself to his left. You cannot look at him. Can hardly listen. If it works, it works. But if it doesn’t…

The Tower’s hum is unfamiliar. Unlike its counterpart on the Source, this one has not been plundered and lived in, rent and reanimated. It’s dormant, much like the bodies of the Scions had been prior to your return. But this man at your side. He isn’t dormant, is he? Would the medicine take? Or were you trying to heal an ailment the slumbering Tower’s keeper would not recognize—would perhaps even deny?

You try closing your eyes. You breathe in old air, ancient air mingling with whatever has slipped in with you. You aren't sure what led you to him. Though you'd grown familiar with the structure's architecture on the First, instinct, not memory, guided your footsteps. And now you feel almost as though you have spent more time waiting at his side than you did traversing the Tower. It didn’t take this long for the Scions, did it? Weak as they were physically, they spiritually snapped into place in a matter of moments. Yet you have had time to stare a hole into the ceiling, and then some. You try closing your eyes. Again.

And if it doesn’t work…

No. You swallow that thought. If it doesn’t _immediately_ work, you will linger as long as it takes. He waited far longer for his destiny. And for you.

_Would you believe me?_

You said yes. And you believed him then. But how can you believe him now, when the world has taught you time and time again that to have something is to lose something, to love someone is to leave or be left? Yes, you feel the heat pooling beneath your eyes, but even now you have to smile. For Haurchefant as much as G’raha Tia. For the Crystal Exarch. For a friend you hope will see himself in himself. And if he does...you suppose it would be less than ideal for his _next_ sight to be the Warrior of Light and Darkness weeping at his side. You wipe your face and rest your arms at your side.

This isn’t so unlike that time before you plunged into the World of Darkness. You rekindle it in your mind’s eye, his hand in yours, your fingers entwined. You both lie on the throne facing the golden gradient of sky rolling over Mor Dhona. He turns to you and asks what you’ll do when your mission is complete. You tell him it’s not up to you and he squeezes your hand. “Always something worth fighting for,” he says, looking back at the sky.

“Someone,” you manage to cough out, picking yourself off the cool crystal beneath you.

He’s blushing by the time you meet eyes, but he looks away—and now that you’re drawing this memory up, you think perhaps that even _then_ he knew what he was meant to do with his future—and sputters something about how he’d have a hero like you chart your path by something other than the misadventures of a humble scholar.

He is, perhaps, the most hands-on scholar you have ever met. So dedicated is he to his field, that he’s become a not insignificant part of it himself: a historian for the history books. For books about heroes, too.

The weight of it hits you. The weight of this body at your side, the weight it’s had on futures, presents, and pasts. The weight of his hand in your hand now, somehow, again. After all this sleeping, the first move he makes is one he’s made in two timelines, in two worlds, in countless dreams and memories.

“My friend,” he says, his voice like the ash of a burning whisper. “This time...let us grow old _together_.”

“Together,” you say. And it is all you can say before laughing your tears free of your cheeks and curling your body onto its side. His arm—his _living, flesh and bone arm_ —creeps beneath your neck. Only when you are forehead to forehead, holding one another in a mirror embrace, can you open your eyes.

“Are you all right?” he asks.

“I ought to be asking you.”

“Forgive me, but...you are the one crying…” He runs his hand across your cheek, fingers soft and dry, like the pages of an old book. “And after all you’ve done to care for me, that simple question is…” He takes a deep breath and you feel his eyebrows knitting against yours. “'Tis the least I can do.”

“You have done enough,” you say. “For now let us do nothing. Let us rest.”

He half-laughs and closes his eyes. By now his tail has woken up to dance around his hips, to bat at yours before coming to rest across your thigh. “Speaking from experience, I must attest this is far from an ideal resting place. Especially for a pair.”

“Oh, but Raha...we shall need all the rest we can get.”

“What for, my warrior?”

“Just as I promised,” you say. “An adventure.”

**Author's Note:**

> I need it to be FFXIV writing challenge month NOW
> 
> I'm on Twitter @crystalsexarch
> 
> I couldn't decide if I wanted it to be unmourning or unmorning because both have reasons, so I went with the latter because it feels? less spoilery. Maybe. I dunno. Anyway, happy international catboy holiday.


End file.
